Gender roles in entertainment.

This was originally in response to a foolish post at this NSFW image.  I felt it has value here, though it is speaking to one specific person; it also speaks to a problem and type of person at large.

You have a two layered problem.  Firstly, you believe that your fantasy version of Samus is the "true" one.  She is not.  You did not create her.  She did not have any female identity before; she had the movie and comic book "Woman with tragic past became complete ideal man to deal with it." if she had anything.  It was those comics which you claim to have read that first established her as a real human being instead of a one-dimensional caricature.

A real woman, and most men, would actually be extremely screwed up by seeing their parents murdered at a young age.  Worse than that, one of the only two things she came to love since then?  Dead due to the actions of the Space Pirates.  Now she comes here, and here's the other of the two things she loved, and here's the Space Pirates again.  What was her answer?  She reverted instantly to wayward daughter trying to win her Daddy's approval again.

Pay attention to the plot, Adam did not tell Samus she could not use her weapons, Samus shoved that responsibility into his hands.  She tried to instantly set herself up as more loyal to Adam than his own men.  "See Daddy?  I'm powerful but I won't subvert you or make your friends look bad.

 Aren't I a good girl?"  If he had refused her outright, she would have fallen right into another attention seeking behavior.  The entire game is Adam trying his best to help a woman he loved, who was not entirely sane.  He had seemingly hoped that she found herself after she left his command, but she had not.  Sometimes the only way to help someone deal with their issues is to play along until the time is right, and then break

those issues one by one.  It's actually common psychotherapy and not at all unresonable a good leader becomes familiar with things that work to help the troops under him.  Leadership is not "I order, you obey".  Leadership is showing others they can count on you and trust your judgment.

Here's the thing: issues that deep are not just "shrug and get over it", like your fantasy Samus has done.  That is not feminine identity at all; it is masculine identity.  You are correct, Samus is the first female character in all of gaming; and it didn't shine until Other M.  Is she a bit crazy?  You bet!  Why do you think the game's name is an anagram of "Mother"?

By the time Fusion rolls around, many years later, she's worked through it all and now only has fond memories of Adam.  She no longer has the Daddy issues to the same level, but they're clearly not gone entirely.  If she must take orders from above... it's most normal for her to take them from Adam.

And that's the thing.  Issues aren't solved that easily.  If you take into a relationship with a real woman that she is being "weak" because of psychological issues, you'll either have yourself a fine doormat, or you'll find yourself dumped for a better man.

Some have observed that the characterization of women in popular media has a lot to do with our amazing divorce rates; and honestly I'd tend to agree.  The first time a genuinely flawed but fundamentally strong woman shows up in a game, people instantly think of.. well.. the image above. 

That's not a healthy view of women, that unless they are men with tits they obviously wish to be used and abused like whores.

And this is not even NEW!  The series creator said the entire existence of Samus was based on Ripley from Aliens.  Vasquez was a man with tits, Ripley was not.  All of Ripley's actions were driven by the loss of her first crew, and of the life she lived on Earth before.  Newt was her daughter, and she would NOT lose another daughter to these Aliens!  Did the aliens directly take her real daughter?  Well.. yes.  If it were not for that first encounter she would have been able to see her little girl grow up.

At the time, Ellen Ripley challenged gender roles, and ti was wonderful.. but entertainment media then went mad with it, took entirely the wrong lesson from it.  Ellen Ripley was a woman driven to her extreme, and she reacted as any strong woman would.. she stepped up.

People over the next 30 years saw Ripley stepping up... and then promptly forgot the reasons why she did so.  They replaced her drive and motivation with male stoicism.  Female action heroes today are ridiculed if they ever display the slightest weakness, and people are even shocked when the tomboy sorts aren;t auto-magically lesbians.

Real life is a lot lot LOT more complex, and this is the reason feminists aren't any happier with modern female heroes than they were with the helpless damsels in distress of old.  Look what effect it had on you people, if a woman doesn't fit into one of your narrowly defined molds; you can't handle it and instantly resort to degrading even the creator of the series for writing his character as he sees fit.